


Trust The Thorn In Your Side: It's Trying To Tell You Something

by HighlyOpinionatedNerd



Category: Gintama
Genre: Gintoki's Birthday Bash 2020, Illustrated, M/M, Strong Language, aaaaaand arson, hope you enjoy it ; ), mentions of past traumas, mild violence, mutual awkward crushes that somehow flourish even in the worst possible circumstances: the fic, warnings for: child abduction/forced labor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-07
Updated: 2020-10-07
Packaged: 2021-03-07 22:08:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,466
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26884894
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HighlyOpinionatedNerd/pseuds/HighlyOpinionatedNerd
Summary: Hijikata and Gintoki team up for a top secret mission in the countryside. Along the way, they’ll uncover corruption, dark family secrets, a surprising aptitude for espionage, and a mutual attraction that neither of them quite knows what to do with...
Relationships: Hijikata Toshirou/Sakata Gintoki
Comments: 13
Kudos: 65
Collections: Gintoki's Birthday Bash 2020





	Trust The Thorn In Your Side: It's Trying To Tell You Something

The Shinsengumi barracks run along the back wall of the compound. One big, long building, three stories high. Every man has his own room, for which every man is profoundly grateful. Some of them have been on the force long enough to remember how it was before they had the funds to build their nice, new barracks. In the old days, it had been at least two to a room, sometimes three if they had more people than they had rooms.

During those early days, Hijikata had shared a room with both Kondo and Okita. He had never been more relieved in his life than the day the construction was finally finished, when they’d been allowed to move into their new rooms and he’d laid down on his bed, with a double-locked door in between him and Okita’s latest outlandish booby trap.

Their base was right in the middle of town, and the noises of traffic and the bustle of the people could almost always be heard from outside. But you learned to sleep through it. Hijikata had never been particularly bothered by it before.

Until tonight. Some loud sound from outside had woken him up.

As he sat up and blinked his eyes blearily, he heard it again- the distinctive sound of something smacking against the glass of his window.

He stumbled out of bed, still half-asleep, and peered outside.

Even in the dark, there was no mistaking that silver hair. For some reason, Sakata Gintoki was standing in the street, throwing rocks at Hijikata’s window in the middle of the night.

Hijikata frowned, and reached out to open the window.

Just in time for the next rock to hit him square in the forehead.

“ _Ow_!”

“Whoops!” Gintoki exclaimed from the street below him. “Sorry!”

“Dude, what the fuck?!” Hijikata hissed, now fully awake, one hand pressed to his bruised forehead. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?!”

“I need to talk to you,” Gintoki said. “Come down for a sec.”

“What? No! It’s the middle of the night! Come back during fucking business hours!”

“No, wait! It has to be now! Look, ok, it’s important. I really need to talk to you. Please?”

Hijikata scowled. Since when was Gintoki the kind of guy to say ‘please’?

“...Fine. If it’ll get rid of you, then, fine. Wait right there.”

Grumbling under his breath, he closed the window once again, stepped into his sandals, and headed downstairs.

“Alright,” he growled as he approached Gintoki, “I’m here. What do you want?”

Gintoki took a deep breath. “Listen, ok. Just, listen. I’m about to go off and do something extremely stupid and dangerous.”

“Dangerous how?”

“I, uh...I can’t say.”

“Yorozuya-”

“Look, I know it’s late, and I’m sorry, but, just hear me out, ok? I’ll explain as best I can.”

“Hmph. Fine.”

“I got some intel earlier from, uh, a friend. He asked me to help out with this job, and I agreed to. But, all I’ve been able to find out since is that there’s much more to this than I have any idea about. The more I think about it, the more certain I am that I won’t be able to do it by myself.”

“By yourself?” Hijikata asked, frowning. “You’re not bringing your kids along?”

“No, no. This is not the kind of thing I want to get them involved in. But, like I said, I can’t do it alone. So, this is me offering you an olive branch, I guess? If you come with me, I swear, we’ll do this whole thing your way. Completely legally. When we take down the bad guys, we’ll send them to jail, and have a proper trial, and all that.”

“And if I don’t?”

“Then, I’ll get Zura to come with me, and we’ll do it his way. Look, I’m not trying to force you into anything. You don’t have to put yourself in danger just because I said so. But if that’s the case, all I ask is that you don’t tell anyone that we had this conversation. At least, not until it’s over. I wouldn’t want to draw their attention onto you.”

Hijikata frowned harder, and crossed his arms. His relationship with Gintoki was tenuous at best, but he was pretty sure that he knew him well enough to be sure that if he was worried, Hijikata should be worried, too. Just from the way he was acting, Hijikata can tell there was something really wrong. His instincts were screaming at him that he didn’t want to get himself into whatever trouble was brewing, that it was bad news, but something didn’t feel right about turning him down. Not when he had come to Hijikata for help first, and taken such care not to say anything that might put him in danger if he were to turn him down.

“...It’s really that bad, huh?”

“Yeah. It is.”

“You said, if I were to come with you. Does that mean, whatever’s going on, it’s not in Edo?”

“Mmhmm. It’s pretty far out in the country, actually.”

Hijikata sighed. “I’ll have to take off work.”

“Wait, are you saying you’ll come?”

“I guess so. When do we need to leave?”

“I mean, as soon as possible. Now, would be good.”

“I have to let Kondo-san know what’s going on.”

“Just leave him a note.”

“Saying what? You haven’t told me where we’re going.”

“I don’t want t-”

“I know, I know. You don’t want to put anyone in danger. So, what do you want me to do, then, lie? I’m not going to lie to Kondo-san.”

“Just put the blame on me, then. Tell him I dragged you into it.”

Hijikata shook his head. As much as he hated to admit it, no one would even question it if he were to say it like that.

“You had better not make me regret this, Yorozuya. I’m trusting you, here.”

“I know. I’m grateful. I’ll do whatever I can.”

“I’m going back in to pack a bag and leave a note. Then we can go.”

Hijikata let Gintoki lead him to the train station, stood by and tried not to doze off again as he booked them tickets to some town in the southwest he had never heard of, and followed him through the train to an empty car at the very back.

“Alright,” he said, once the train finally lurched into motion beneath them, “we’re on our way, then.”

“Yup,” Gintoki said, slouching low in his seat and rubbing his eyes. “No turning back now.”

“So when exactly are you going to tell me what we’re doing, here, huh?”

“I’m going, I’m going! I’m just...I’m just trying to think of the right way to say it…”

“Yorozuya. You wake me up at four AM, hit me in the face with a fucking rock-”

“I said I was sorry for that!”

“-put me on a train to who-knows-where, and I still have no idea what we’re doing this for! Just tell me what you know, for crying out loud!”

“Alright, already! Jeez. Alright. You know Sakamoto, right?”

“Uh. Should I?”

“He wears dumb sunglasses and has a stupid laugh. Does that ring a bell?”

“That is. Not a lot to go on.”

“Oh come on, you have to have met him at least once, right?”

“He’s one of your friends?”

“Yeah, something like that. He runs the Kaientai. Anyway, he’s the one who told me all this.”

“Ok.”

“He called me the other day, and said that his ship had picked up an escape pod. In the middle of empty space, no idea where it had come from. And inside, they found a, quote, ‘emaciated’ human kid.”

“A human?”

“Yeah. That, in and of itself, isn’t really that odd, from what I understand. I mean, Sakamoto and half his crew are humans that make a living offworld. There are humans working on ships and living on colony worlds all over the place. But then this kid woke up in their infirmary and started telling them his story.”

“Go on.”

“It’s, uh. Not pretty.”

“Just _tell_ me. Please.”

Gintoki exhaled slowly. “So, apparently, this kid grew up in a poor village out in the country. His father died, his mother was stuck trying to provide for him and his three younger siblings on her own. But she injured her leg, and wasn’t able to work. So, for a while there, the family didn’t even have money to put food on the table. That, and their landlord was threatening to kick them out at the end of the month if they couldn’t pay their rent.”

“As bad as that is, there are hundreds of families in a similar situation just in Japan alone.”

“I know. But there’s more. After his mother hurt her leg, this kid- twelve, thirteen years old- started going around town trying to find some work to do, to earn money for his family. And somehow or other, he ends up speaking to a wealthy farmer, who lives a little way out of town. This dude offered him a job working in his fields, but wanted him to sign a contract first.”

“A contract? For a thirteen year old boy?”

“I know, right? You and I both know that’s not binding, but this kid didn’t know that. He went ahead and signed it, not knowing what half the stuff in there meant. What he was agreeing to.”

“Like what?”

“Well. As near as Sakamoto and I can figure from what he said, this contract was basically asking him to sign himself into an indentured service working for this farmer. He’d receive some money up front, and then have to work a certain amount of time before receiving the rest of what he’d been promised. I think it was like, six months or something.”

“Jesus...”

“Oh, don’t worry, it gets worse. The work that they relegated to this kid was all super dangerous shit that no one else would ever want to do. Mixing insecticides and other chemicals without any protective gear. Hard manual labor in the sun with no breaks. They even made him crawl through a partially collapsed mine shaft a couple of times.”

“Wait, wait, was there a mine on the farm, too?”

“I don’t know. The kid was a little shaky on a lot of the details.”

“Understandable.”

“Anyway, after a few weeks, he was told they’d be moving him offworld, to work with a terraforming team. He didn’t want to do that, obviously, but they didn’t really give him a choice. Shipped him off to wherever the fuck the next day.”

“What did his mother have to say about this?”

“Oh, she had no idea about any of it. His ‘employer’ kept him on site. He said he slept in a barn, on a straw mattress, with at least two dozen others like him crammed in there.”

“That’s horrible.”

“You’re telling me. Sakamoto said he knew he had to call me as soon as he heard the bit about there being other kids working there with him.”

“Because that means it’s not an isolated incident,” Hijikata nodded. “This farm owner is making his money exploiting the labor of poor children.”

“Exactly. All they hear is, ‘here’s some money for your family right away, and if you work hard you can earn more to help them’. They have no idea what they’re getting themselves into. They just want that first little bit of immediate relief.”

“Do we have any idea if any of that money actually made it to this boy’s family in the first place?”

“No, but honestly, I doubt it.”

“So, from the mom’s perspective, her son just vanished one day without a trace and never returned.”

“Yeah.”

The two of them lapsed into silence for a moment. Hijikata had to sit still for a moment with his head in his hands, processing all that.

“What else,” he said eventually, sitting up, “what else did your friend tell you? Anything?”

“Not much. The way the kids were treated at their terraforming location was reportedly even worse than at the farm. Little food and water, only a few hours of rest every night. No medical attention for the sick. They were beaten severely for bad behavior. It’s a miracle this particular kid managed to escape at all, let alone that Sakamoto happened to pick him up. Look, dude, I told you it was heavy. I warned you.”

“Yes, you did.” Hijikata took a deep breath. “So. We’re going to stop this guy. That’s why we’re here.”

“Well. Yes, but, here’s the thing: I don’t think it’s just one guy.”

“You don’t?”

“No. Like I said earlier, I don’t really know much about what I’m getting into here, either. I tried, I asked everyone I know for information, and a few other people beyond that, too. But no one would tell me anything. I got the sense that some of them knew more than they were letting on, but that they were scared. So they held back.”

“Scared of what? Retaliation for snitching? How could anyone possibly know it was them?”

“Let me put it to you another way. You ever busted any mafia outfits with the Shinsengumi?”

“We’ve tried. We don’t always succeed.”

“Because the witnesses don’t cooperate. Do they? Because they’re scared.”

Hijikata’s eyes widened. “I see. You think we’re dealing with a full-on organized crime syndicate.”

“I don’t think that’s the word I’d use, but yeah. That’s the gist of it.”

“I gotta say, in your shoes I think I’d share those suspicions.”

“It makes sense, in an awful, twisted kind of way, doesn’t it? I mean, that’s how the rich have always stayed rich. By exploiting and oppressing the poor any way they could find.”

Hijikata frowned. “I agree that being cautious and not letting on that we’re onto them is the right thing to do. What I don’t get is what you think we’re going to be able to accomplish by ourselves. This is big. We could do so much more with the rest of the Shinsengumi, or even better yet, the assistance of local law enforcement. We could launch a full scale undercover investigation-”

“No, no way. At least, not yet. An operation that large, with that many people involved, can’t possibly go without being found out for long. If we went in as blind as we are now with that plan, all we’d get is our people hurt.”

“Well, then, what is your plan?”

“I don’t know, ok? I don’t know yet. Nothing is set in stone.”

“Back it up then. What is it that you _want_ out of this?”

“I just want to gather information. Somehow. I don’t know what that looks like, and I won’t until we get there and get into it. I want to, to test the waters, you know? Before we do anything drastic. That’s why I asked you to come with me. To figure out what to do with the information we get. Whether or not to bring in the rest of the cops, like you said.”

“I don’t make those kinds of calls. Kondo-san does. You should have knocked on his window instead.”

Gintoki shook his head. “I wanted it to be you, not him.”

“...Why?”

“Well, you’re the brains of the Shinsengumi. Everyone knows that. You’re the plan guy. I figure I’m gonna need that experience of yours on this job.” He shrugged. “Plus, I know you. And I know Kondo, too, and it’s not that I don’t trust him, but...his dumb ass plus my dumb ass trying to be all incognito and shit is a recipe for disaster, and a risk I don’t want to have to take. You’re smart, maybe even smart enough to stop me from getting myself killed.”

“I already agreed to do it, Yorozuya. You don’t have to flatter me.”

“Wasn’t trying to. Really!” he insisted when Hijikata raised an eyebrow skeptically. “I know we don’t always see eye to eye on everything, but that doesn’t mean I don’t know smart when I see it. I, uh, respect that about you. You’re smart, you’re strong, you’re experienced...why the hell wouldn’t I want you with me on this, you know?”

“...Oh.”

“Yeah. So.” Gintoki shrugged awkwardly. “I’m just glad you said you’d come. I thought for sure you’d think I was crazy.”

“I do think you’re crazy.”

“And you said yes anyway?”

“You weren’t acting like yourself at all. I figured it must be something really important, to get you that wound up. You wanna talk about experience? You’ve got three times more fighting experience than me, especially when it comes to world-ending threats. You came to me for help, trusted me with this information. Did you really think I wouldn’t trust you back?”

Gintoki blinked. “Well, when you put it like that, I guess…”

“Yeah.”

There was a moment of silence in the car, during which Hijikata deliberately looked anywhere but at Gintoki.

“It’ll be a few hours before we get where we’re going,” Gintoki said finally. “We should try to sleep.”

“Works for me. And when we get there...Like you said, we’ll just take it one step at a time.”

Gintoki awoke in the morning to Hijikata gently shaking his shoulder, sunlight streaming through the window, and the feeling of the train lurching to a stop beneath their feet.

The two of them gathered the few possessions they’d brought with them and disembarked, heading out into the mostly-deserted station.

“Well,” Gintoki said as they walked, fighting off a yawn, “where to?”

“Why are you asking me?”

“I don’t know, ‘cause I thought you’d have something to say? What do you usually do when you work undercover like this?”

“Usually I’m in Edo, so, not hauling around all this stuff. Maybe we should start by finding a place to crash?”

“Sounds good to me.”

The town, they discovered upon leaving the train station, was barely a town at all. The few businesses and shops there were lined the one-lane main street. In the distance they could see a few widely-spaced houses, amidst the high summer crops.

They chatted idly as they walked, taking in the sights. A pub, a general store, a tiny bank. A few assorted beggars, here and there. No schoolhouse, at least that they could see. No cars, just a couple of wagons. It was like something out of another time.

“I don’t know how they do it,” Gintoki said. “I mean, where do they get their news from, word of mouth? That must take ages to reach out here! I wouldn’t be able to stand it.”

“Not like they can leave. I mean, just look at this place. You can tell just from the outsides that everyone here’s dirt poor.”

“I guess.”

“Plus, I don’t want to hear you say anything about word of mouth news, Yorozuya. You’re the biggest gossip I know!”

“Ok, wow, first of all, _rude_!”

“It’s the truth!”

“Still rude. And second of all, I have a name, you know.”

“Yeah, I know.”

“Oh, so you’re gonna be like that about it, huh?”

“Hey, look!”

“What?”

Hijikata pointed, and Gintoki looked around to see a man in a uniform featuring a shiny badge that was obviously meant to designate him as some sort of local law enforcement strolling down the street in their direction.

“We should talk to him.”

“I thought we agreed not to involve anyone else yet?”

“We did. I just want to get a feel for what we’re dealing with here. Test the waters, like you said.”

“Hmm...I don’t know if that’s the best idea, man…”

“It’ll be fine. Just, follow my lead, ok? Excuse me, sir!”

Hijikata waved, and the officer stopped short, raising an eyebrow at them.

“Can I help you?” he asked irritably. Besides the badge, he was wearing worn, western style boots, and a frown.

“We’re just passing through,” Hijikata said, playing it casual. “And we were wondering if you could tell us if there’s an inn around these parts?”

“And whether or not the inn has any vacancies at the moment?” Gintoki asked, doing his best to appear as nonchalant as possible.

“Just down the street. Should be rooms open.”

“Thanks.”

“Say, we’re looking for work, too,” Hijikata said carefully, with a brief, telling glance at Gintoki out of the corner of his eye. “Are any of the farms around here looking to hire additional help?”

“No sir, not at this time.”

“Really? The harvest is coming up. And we’d been told there were some really large operations in the area. There can’t really be enough hands in this town for all that, can there?”

The officer scowled. “I’m telling you, they’re not hiring.”

“Maybe we’ll stop by later and ask around, just in case.”

“Listen here, Mr…”

“Kondo,” Hijikata lied readily, “Kondo Toshimaru.”

“And you?” The officer grunted, turning to Gintoki.

“Uh,” said Gintoki, his brain suddenly completely blank, “I’m, uh...Paako.”

The officer raised an eyebrow skeptically. “Paako.”

“You heard me.”

“Well, _Paako_ , Kondo, you should know this. I know every land owner from here to the coast personally, and when I tell you not to bother them, I mean it. If word gets back to me that you’ve been asking around, despite my generous warning, there’s going to be trouble. Are we clear?”

“Crystal, sir.”

“Yeah, absolutely.”

“Good. I suggest you don’t stay too long- we don’t take kindly to outsiders, hereabouts.”

“Well, shit,” Hijikata said quietly as the officer stalked away. “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?

“Probably not, because I’m thinking about how I should have had a fake name prepared before this, but I didn’t and now I’m stuck with Paako.”

“Focus, Yorozuya. That guy _is_ the local law enforcement we were talking about earlier. And he’s in on this!”

“Yeah. Also that.”

“There goes that plan, I guess. Shit.”

“Don’t worry, we’ll figure something else out. Let’s just get to the inn before-”

“‘Scuse me,” a voice interrupted him. A woman just down the street waved at them from her doorway. “You boys just get in?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“How about some breakfast? It’s on the house.”

“Oh, no th-”

“That sounds great, thanks,” Gintoki called loudly. “We’ll be right in.”

“Dude! We didn’t come here to eat, we came to work!” Hijikata hissed.

“Relax. She wants to tell us something.”

“What?”

“During the Joui War, that’s always how country folk would let us know they wanted to help. She might have some information for us.”

Hijikata sighed. “Fine. If you say so.”

“Trust me. When you can’t trust the cops, you gotta turn to the people, right? Come on, you can follow my lead this time.”

They crossed the street and ducked into the tiny little diner the woman had waved at them from. The building was shabby, and the decor inside sparse, but nevertheless, there was something friendly about it, in the way that only small-town businesses can be.

“Have a seat,” their host said, gesturing to a table near the window. “Miso fried rice bowls ok?”

“Yeah, of course! Thanks.”

“Yes, thank you.”

“Alright, coming up.”

“We should at least pay for the food,” Hijikata muttered, sliding into a seat next to Gintoki.

“I think you’d probably just insult her.”

“I feel bad, though.”

“Don’t. She was the one who offered.”

“Hmm…”

A few moments later, the woman returned from the kitchen with two steaming bowls, and set them down in front of Gintoki and Hijikata. The smell alone made Gintoki’s mouth water- he was starving.

“I saw you boys run afoul of the sheriff,” the restaurant owner admitted, sinking into a chair across the table from them. “I want y’all to know, he doesn’t speak for all of us. You’re plenty welcome here.”

“That’s reassuring to hear,” Hijikata said, smiling. “Thank you, ma’am.”

“Sure.”

“If you heard all that,” Gintoki said around a mouthful of breakfast, “maybe you also heard what he said to us when we asked after work in the area?”

“Mm, that I did.” She frowned. “But, on that score? You’d best listen to him. You don’t want to mess with any of the rich folk around here, trust me. Bad business, that.”

“Oh?”

The woman hesitated, biting her lip. “Listen, boys...you didn’t hear this from me, alright?”

“Of course.”

“Cross my heart and hope to die.”

“Pretty much every decent-sized operation in the area is in with the CAPS.”

“Sorry, the what?”

“The Commercial Agricultural Production Syndicate. That’s what they call themselves.”

“Syndicate? Hmm, you don’t say.”

“Man, shut up.”

“Even if they were looking to take on extra help, you wouldn’t want to work for them anyway. Best just avoid them altogether.”

“And why’s that?”

“There’s all kinds of rumors of what happens to people who get on the CAPS’ bad side. Anything from vandalism to suspicious house fires, to strange disappearances…”

At the back of the shop, a kettle began whistling shrilly. The woman stood and hurried back to tend the stove, while Gintoki and Hijikata exchanged troubled looks.

“Tea?” she asked as she approached the table once more, holding up the kettle.

“Yes, please.”

“Sure. Thank you.”

“Another question for you, ma’am. If we’re not able to find work in this town, we’ll have to keep moving and looking. Do you know who else is in with these CAPS people? So we can avoid them, I mean, of course.”

“Oh, pretty much any old, wealthy farming family you can think of,” she said, as she busied herself pouring them all steaming glasses of tea. “The Yamanadas, the Koutaharis, the Shimataros, the Hijikatas, the Tsunodas...all of them.”

Beside Gintoki, Hijikata stiffened, eyes wide. Gintoki froze as the full realization of what he’d just heard hit him. And then a dozen panicky thoughts began to flood his brain all at once.

The Hijikata family? Really? Was that common knowledge? Would the angry sheriff they’d run into earlier be able to trace Hijikata back to his extended family? What were they gonna do now???

Eventually, the thought that beat out the others was that, most importantly at that moment, they needed to keep from blowing their cover.

Beneath the table, he reached out and silently grabbed hold of Hijikata’s hand, squeezing tight.

And after a moment, he felt Hijikata’s fingers wrap around his and gently squeeze back.

“Basically, if it looks too good to be true, it usually is,” the woman said wearily, setting their tea on the table in front of them. If they offer you a deal, don’t take it. Like I said, there have been....”

“‘Strange disappearances’.”

“Yes.”

“When you say that, you’re not just talking about migrant workers like us,” Gintoki said quietly, “are you?”

She hesitated again, glancing around furtively as if she expected to find the sheriff hiding just around the corner, waiting to catch her saying something she shouldn’t.

“...My nephew turned up missing just at the start of planting season,” she confessed eventually. “Before that, it was the tailor’s son, from the next village over. Before that, the miller’s daughter.”

“And if someone wanted to do something about it,” Gintoki said firmly, holding her gaze intently, “what could they do? Where would they go?”

She shook her head. “‘Someone’ would never even get close. Everything is too heavily-guarded, and there are just too many of them.”

“Still, I’m curious. Humor me. Where would they need to start?”

The woman opened her mouth to answer, but the little bell on the door interrupted as a man in dirt-stained work clothes entered the diner, making her jump.

“Hey, Maya-san! You in here?”

“B-Be with you in a second!”

“Ma’am, please,” Gintoki said as she stood up again, “Just give us a name.”

“It’s too dangerous!”

“No one will ever know. I _swear_.”

“.....Kawamaki Ranch,” she whispered. “Take the road out of town and keep right at the fork.”

“Thank you. Thank you.”

The owner nodded once, thin-lipped, and turned away to see to her other customer.

“I’m sorry,” Gintoki said awkwardly once she was out of earshot, letting go of Hijikata’s hand. “If I had known, I would’ve-”

“Would’ve what?” Hijikata snapped. “Left me back in Edo, none the wiser? This is my _family_ we’re talking about.”

“I know. I just...you shouldn’t have had to find out like that. Sorry.”

Hijikata sighed. “Don’t apologize. It’s not your fault.”

“Still…”

“I don’t know why I’m surprised, honestly. My father was, above all else, a coward, not to mention a liar and a cheat. But, my brother…” he shook his head. “No. This changes nothing. If they go down along with the rest of these CAPS people, then so be it. It’ll be what they deserve.”

“Are you sure?” Gintoki asked tentatively. He didn’t like that look on Hijikata’s face. A moment ago he’d been shocked stiff, and now all of a sudden he was all business again? It didn’t feel right. “Maybe we should take a step back for a second. Gather more information, make a new plan-”

“We can’t afford to back off now! You heard what that woman said. There are more and more kids being taken all the time. Every day we wait is another day closer to the harvest, and another chance for them to swindle someone else’s child away. This has gone on long enough. We need to put a stop to it now.”

“Alright, alright. I’m with you. So, I guess that means we need to go find this Kawamaki place?”

“Yes, but not now. After dark.”

“Alright. The inn, then in the meantime?”

“Yeah. Let’s get going.”

Hijikata stood up and set about gathering his things, eyes downcast. He was upset, Gintoki _knew_ he was.

But he didn’t press him. Hijikata clearly needed time to process everything that had been said. Gintoki certainly knew what that was like. He’d wait, and let him think it over.

Maybe, by the time he was ready to talk about it, Gintoki would have thought of something appropriately comforting and empathetic to say.

“Jesus fuck, is this a ranch, or a top secret evil villain lair?”

“It’s not classy enough to be a top secret lair.”

“I’ve seen fewer guards at government experimental testing facilities, is all I’m saying.”

“Doesn’t change the fact that they’re guarding a barn. All I’m saying.”

“Good point.”

“Wait, hang on, what experimental test facilities have you been to? When did that happen?”

“A-ah, don’t worry about it!”

Hijikata rolled his eyes and turned his attention back to the situation at hand. All joking aside, he had never imagined there would be this many enemies waiting for them here, patrolling in shifts and radioing check-ins every ten minutes or so. He and Gintoki had been observing from a safe distance away for over half an hour now, and had yet to spot any weak points in their security net.

“Maybe we need to adjust our expectations for what we’re going to get out of this,” he admitted.

“Took the words right out of my mouth. Any suggestions?”

“Hmm...do we know what, exactly, are we here for?”

“Your guess is as good as mine, dude. She didn’t say.”

“But we can, like, narrow it down, right? I mean, this place isn’t big enough to process a large amount of trafficked kids. So I think we can rule out that this is the CAPS’ main headquarters.”

“If they even have a real headquarters.”

“If the operation is as big and organized as we think it is, there’d have to be. Matsuraida always says, ‘the business of organized crime is still, first and foremost, a business’. If the Kawamakis are involved with the Syndicate, they’re sure to keep records of their dealings with them. We find those, we’ll know where to go next.”

“...You really think they’ll be that predictable? Feels too easy.”

“Oh, I never said it was going to be easy. We’re still going to have to find a way through all that.”

“Yeah...roof is probably out, I don’t think there’s a way for us to get up there from down here without being seen.”

“Agreed.”

“And I’m not liking our chances of walking through the front door, either.”

“I think we can rule that out, yeah.”

“So, we’re sneaking in, I guess.”

Hijikata sighed. “I guess so. Man I wish I had a better idea, though.”

“Come on, sneaking’s not that bad! They’ll never even know we were there. We’ll be in and out, like James Bond and...what’s another one? Oh, Remington Steele! Does he count?”

“What are you _talking_ about?”

“You know, spy guys. Come on, you have to at least know who James Bond is!”

“Vaguely, I guess. That’s not where I would have gone with that metaphor, though.”

“Oh?”

“Ninjas, man. All you had to say was, ‘like ninjas’.”

“Noooo, no no no. I know too many real-life ninjas. I don’t want to be compared to them.”

“Alright, alright.”

“Batman! Batman is another really good one. You know, cause he moves in the shadows.”

“Alright already! Come on, if we’re doing this thing, let’s do it, before the sun comes up.”

The two of them ducked down low and stalked their way through the field of whatever crop it was, maneuvering their way closer to the Kawamaki’s barn and it’s attached little side building, the most heavily guarded spot on the property.

“As soon as that patrol rounds the corner, make a run for the side door,” Hijikata whispered in Gintoki’s ear.

“Think you can pick the lock before the next one comes around?” Gintoki whispered back, his breath warm on the side of Hijikata’s neck.

“I hope so. Keep a lookout for me anyway, just in case.”

“You got it.”

The moment the guards were out of sight they broke from their cover and dashed across to the barn. Hijikata’s heart pounded as he reached for the door handle. This kind of thing never got any less terrifying.

He barely managed to get it open in time. He dragged Gintoki through into the barn and closed the door again just as the next patrol came into view. The two of them breathed a quiet sigh of relief.

“Where to next?”

“No idea, but I have a feeling we’ll know it when we see it.”

The barn was dark, and cluttered with strange equipment. Aside from the occasional stirring of the livestock penned along the far wall, it was apparently deserted.

“I doubt there’s anything in here for us. Let’s try the-”

“Look out!”

Gintoki suddenly lunged at Hijikata and shoved him flat against the wall, just as another door at the other end of the barn opened, and two curious guards peered inside.

There was a brief moment of pause while the guards squinted inside, sweeping their flashlights back and forth. Hijikata fought to stay utterly still, to keep his breathing quiet, to look anywhere but at Gintoki’s chest, suddenly right in front of his face…

“See?” He finally heard one of the guards say. “I told you it was nothing to worry about.”

“Yeah, yeah,” the other one grumbled. “Come on, then.”

The door closed again, leaving them in darkness once more.

“Sorry about that,” Gintoki said quietly, pushing himself off the wall and away from Hijikata. “Uh...you were saying?”

“L-lets...Let’s try that other building.”

“Agreed.”

“This way.”

As Hijikata reached out to pick the lock on the second door, Gintoki wordlessly drew his sword, standing ready just in case there was someone on the other side of it waiting for them. Hijikata nodded, glad that the two of them were on the same page.

But thankfully, there were no enemies past the door. Just a dark hallway, with a handful of doors branching off in either direction.

“Look for an office, or something,” Hijikata muttered, pulling out his lighter.

He and Gintoki took opposite sides of the hall, moving stealthily from door to door. Most of what Hijikata saw was just more farm equipment, and he began to worry that they really were in the wrong place after all.

“Oh my god...” Gintoki said suddenly, stopping in his tracks.

“What?” Hijikata asked, whipping around. “Did you find-”

“No. Come here and look.”

Hijikata crossed the hallway and lifted his tiny light to peer through the little window on the door. What he saw made his jaw drop in shock.

Inside, in a space about half the size of a normal person’s bedroom, were at least half a dozen children, blinking blearily in the face of the light.

“Those mother _fuckers_ ,” Gintoki muttered venomously under his breath, reaching for the door handle.

“No, wait,” Hijikata said, grabbing his arm.

“We can’t leave them here!”

“I’m not saying we will! Just that, if we turn them loose now, without a plan to get them out safely, they’ll be caught all over again, and us with them.”

“And what do you propose we do, then?”

“Find what we came for first. Come back for them on the way out.”

“Hmph. Fine. We’ll be back,” he said quietly to the kids through the window. “I promise.”

“Come on. I want to get out of here as soon as possible.”

Finally, at the very end of the hall, they found it. A door that led into a small room with a desk covered in loose papers and enough filing cabinets to line the entire far wall.

“We need a map,” Hijikata said as they slipped inside, “or an address book. Something, something like...”

“Like that?” Gintoki said, pointing to a ledger that lay open on the desktop.

“Yeah,” Hijikata said, reaching out to flip some pages. There, on the inside cover, were a couple of hastily-scrawled addresses. “Yeah, this is it!”

“Should we, like, make a copy? They’re bound to notice if we take that whole thing.”

“They’ll notice their kids missing, too.”

“Oh yeah. Good point.”

“This is more than enough,” Hijikata said decisively, snapping the ledger shut. “Let’s go.”

“Back out the way we came?”

“Unless you have a better idea. Can you keep those kids quiet and in line until we’re out?”

“Leave it to me.”

Gintoki hurried back out into the hall, and Hijikata followed, carefully closing the office door again behind him. As Gintoki cracked the door to the kids’ room and explained to them what they needed to do, Hijikata made his way down the hall towards the dark barn, carefully checking that no other guards had decided to come inside.

“Ready when you are,” Gintoki murmured from behind him.

“Alright, good. You guys follow my lead, ok? Stay quiet, and move fast. Let’s go.”

He slipped through the door into the barn, leading the gaggle of wide-eyed, terrified kids behind him. At the door he waited until he saw the shadows of the patrolling guards pass, counted to ten, threw open the door and sprinted out into the night.

The eldest of the kids broke away from his lead on the way out the door, heading in the general direction of the Kawamaki’s closest neighbor’s land. The others followed her lead. Hijikata let them go, and kept running towards the road that would take them back to town, clutching the ledger to his chest. Gintoki followed at his heels, frequently looking over his shoulder.

But no guards appeared out of the night to chase them. No alarms rang out behind them. It seemed that, miraculously enough, both they and the kids had managed to escape without notice.

Still, Hijikata had never been one to push his luck.

“Keep running,” he called over his shoulder. “The further away we are when they realize something’s wrong, the better.”

“I just thought of something,” Gintoki called back. “The sheriff!”

“What? What about him?”

“He backs the Syndicate! As soon as he hears what happened, he’s going to come looking for us!”

“Shit, you’re right…”

“What do we do?”

“...Leave. We have to leave. As soon as we get back, we need to pack up and go. We’ll wait at the train station for the first available tickets and get out before he has the chance.”

“He’ll warn the others that we’re onto them.”

“And we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it. For now, let’s just try to make it through the night.”

“Do you think they’ll be alright?”

“For the fifth time, Yorozuya, I’m sure they’ll be fine. I’m sure the small-time farmers in the area all know what goes on at the Kawamaki place, and would be more than willing to help those kids get back where they came from.”

“I’d feel better knowing for sure, though.”

“There was nothing more we could have done for them. You know that.”

“I know. I know.”

Hijikata sighed and rubbed his eyes. He and Gintoki were sitting on a bench outside the train station, under a dim street light, waiting for their ride to arrive.

Hijikata was exhausted. Both mentally and physically. He wanted nothing more than to lie down and sleep for at least a week, and not think about corrupt agriculturalists and their pocket sheriffs, or enslaved children, or the old nightmares from his past this whole thing had dragged back to the surface ever, ever again.

But he didn’t have that luxury. Not tonight.

He and Gintoki sat on a bench outside the train station, under the light of a solitary streetlamp. The ledger sat on his lap, with a uniquely heavy and menacing atmosphere about it.

He took a deep breath and reached out, to open the cover.

“Wait,” Gintoki said suddenly, reaching out and grabbing his wrist. “Wait. You don’t have to do that.”

“I have to find out where we’re going, don’t I? The station opens in just a few minutes.”

“That’s not all you’re going to go in there looking for, and you know it.”

“And?! So what? I have a right to know about my family’s involvement in this!”

“I know! I just...maybe you shouldn’t read it yet. It’s been a long night. Maybe you should just leave it alone, read it some other ti-”

“Gintoki.”

“-me, some other day...Uh. Y-yeah?”

“I appreciate you trying to look out for me. But I have to know.”

Gintoki sighed, and let go of Hijikata’s arm. “Alright. Fuck it, then. Open it.”

Hijikata turned his attention back to the ledger. Slowly, he opened the cover, and flipped through the pages until he caught a glimpse of his family name. Little by little he figured out how the book was organized, and before long he had found the pages that detailed the history of the Hijikatas’ dealings with the CAPS.

“My father did use indentured kids for labor,” he said quietly, trailing his fingers down the page. “To process cotton, and other crops. He just didn’t keep them on the property, they stayed on a neighbor’s farm, where it looks like they also worked the fields.”

“But look, here,” Gintoki said, pointing. “There. The numbers go way down there. What does that note say right there?”

“‘In transit from Shimataro to Yoshida’.”

“So they weren’t even there to work, then.”

“No.”

“What changed?”

“That was the year my father died. My brother took over.”

“So your brother wasn’t part of this, after all. Not really.”

“He may not have contributed to the problem, but didn’t do anything to put a stop to it, either.”

“What could he have done? Face it. He had to make the best he could of a bad situation. He was trying to protect the rest of your family. To protect you.”

“Yeah,” Hijikata mumbled, “yeah. I guess you’re right. Listen, uh…..thanks.”

“Sure,” Gintoki said. He smiled, evidently trying to be reassuring, but it was a grim kind of smile. It was obvious he was exhausted, too. “Now go back to finding out where we’re going, before the train leaves without us, will you?”

For the second time in as many nights, they slept aboard a train, headed for some new, unfamiliar place. After much discussion, they had decided not to stay in the small town nearest the CAPS’s rural headquarters, where they would be much more likely to stand out and attract unfriendly attention. Instead they had opted for a larger town a little ways off, the better to stay under the radar.

They booked a room in an actual hotel this time, when they arrived, and spent the day pouring over the ledger and brainstorming attack plans together. Not that they got very far. They spent most of that time marvelling at the sheer extent of the terrible things that the CAPS had somehow gotten away with, right under everyone’s noses.

In the evening, Hijikata went out for some supplies. He crossed the busy street outside the hotel and walked a few blocks down to the nearest convenience store and stocked up on junk food and other odds and ends they didn’t bring with them.

The sun was sinking below the horizon as he made his way back to the hotel, a couple of bags full of stuff in each hand. Another day gone, just like that. He still felt drained, but not in a sleepy kind of way. His brain was too busy for sleep. He was debating spending some more time going over that ledger before bed, even though he knew it wouldn’t help his racing thoughts any.

He opened the door to their room to find it almost completely pitch black inside, the sun having almost completely set. He frowned, wondering if Gintoki had gone out. Until he spotted a glimpse of that telltale silver hair, reflecting the light from the hallway, on the ground near the bed.

“Hey,” he said, flicking the light switch nearest the door on, “are you ok?”

“Me? Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine.”

“You’re laying on the floor in the dark, by yourself,” Hijikata pointed out.

“It’s comfortable down here,” Gintoki said stubbornly. “That’s all. I’m fine, man, really.”

“Is it about the CAPS thing?”

“No, I’m pretty sure they don’t have anything to do with it being comfortable to lay on the floor.”

“Gintoki.”

“Alright, alright! I’m upset! Are you happy now!?”

“No. Honestly, I feel pretty crappy, too.”

“This whole situation, man. It just sucks. I can’t seem to get over it.”

Hijikata set his grocery bags down on the small table in the corner, then moved to stand over Gintoki. “Do you want to talk about it?”

“No,” Gintoki said. He looked downright miserable. “I want to go back in time and tell past me not to pick up the phone when Sakamoto calls. I want to forget the last couple of days entirely.”

“That’s not likely to happen, though, is it.”

“No. I guess not.”

Hijikata hesitated for a moment, but then he knelt, and stretched himself out on the floor, too, with his head near Gintoki’s.

“So talk about it, then. Tell me what’s on your mind.”

Gintoki sighed heavily. “I don’t know. I guess...I think what’s fucking me up is the thought that, if I had never met Shoyo, I could have been one of those kids. And so could Shinpachi, and Kagura, if I had never met them. So could you. And at least a dozen fucking other people we know. For some reason that’s just. Really messing me up right now.”

“I know what you mean.”

“And I mean, Shoyo, he...he was good. You know? He was just good. And I’ve tried, I’ve tried to be like that, too. But I’m not him. There’s only so much I can do, and it’s never enough. It’s never, ever enough!”

“It feels like there’s always something else, doesn’t it? Like cutting heads off the hydra.”

“Yeah. And it’s just so goddamn _frustrating_.”

Gintoki raised an arm over his face. But not before Hijikata glimpsed the tears of anger beginning to well at the corners of his eyes.

“I’ve been there,” Hijikata said quietly, pretending he hadn’t noticed. “More often than I’d like to admit. I love the Shinsengumi, I really do, but with the things I’ve seen- every serial killer and child rapist and a hundred other kinds of psycho- I’ve thought about quitting so many times.”

“Shut up, no you haven’t.”

“I have, it’s true. There are days when I feel like, anything would be better. Like I’d rather be working some obscure retail job, or something, than dealing with law enforcement any longer.”

“Really?” Gintoki cautiously lowered his arm and turned his head towards Hijikata. “What’s stopped you, then?”

“I’m...not sure how to say it. But at least while I’m with the Shinsengumi, I’m _doing_ something about it, you know? I know for sure that I’m bringing in the killers and the rapists and the freaks and keeping them off the streets. It’s not much, maybe, in the face of all the world’s evils, but at least it’s something. And if I fuck off to work at Starbucks, or whatever, how do I know that anyone is gonna step up to take my place? I don’t. So, I just keep doing it. That, plus...Well.”

“What?”

“There was a time when I felt like...I don’t know, like I was always being taken care of by someone else. My brother took me in after my mother died. Kondo-san took me under his wing after I, uh, left home. I wanted the chance to...you know...prove myself.”

Saying it out loud, Hijikata was suddenly aware how ridiculous that sounded. But Gintoki didn’t laugh, didn’t roll his eyes or try to make a joke. Nothing like that. He just nodded and said quietly, “and even after all this time, it still feels like you have something to prove to someone. Doesn’t it.”

“Yeah,” Hijikata muttered, suddenly fighting to hold back tears of his own. “It does.”

There was a pause as the two of them lapsed into silence, each lost in his own thoughts.

“I know what I said,” Gintoki said eventually, “and a promise is a promise. I’ll do this the right way. But there’s a part of me that wishes I could take it back, you know? Call Sakamoto and Zura and have them raise an army. Come back through and flatten these guys, once and for all.”

“Gintoki…”

“Yeah? What is it?”

“I know what I said too, but I don’t know if that original plan of ours is even a viable option anymore.”

Gintoki frowned at him. “What do you mean?”

“There are too many corrupt cops and judges in on this. We’ll get no help from them.”

“Sooo, what, then? We can’t just drop it now!”

“I’m not saying we should drop it! Just the opposite. I think we need to take matters into our own hands and shut it down. Once and for all, like you said.”

“You mean…”

“Yeah. It might not be the legal thing to do, but I think, in this situation, it _is_ the right thing to do.”

Gintoki grinned. “Alright, then. In that case, let’s get to work.”

Going in for the second time, they were smarter about it. They spent hours planning, strategizing, preparing for every scenario they could think of. They rented a car, the better for a quick getaway. They packed supplies. And once they were safe under the cover of darkness once more, they snuck out of their hotel room through the window- that way, if anyone thought to check, it would appear that they’d been inside all night.

Their target this time around was the Marobo family property, which, according to the ledger, served as the closest thing the CAPS had to a central headquarters. The Marobos directed the entire operation, across not only the whole of rural Japan, but also out in space. Terraforming was one of the Syndicate’s main sources of income.

The Marobos owned a particularly large swath of land, upon which they grew a variety of crops. They also owned their own factory, run almost entirely by captive laborers, where they processed their crops for sale and consumption.

They weren’t going there to collect information, this time. They were on their way there to, as Hijikata had put it, ‘shut it down’.

And as such, there was no point sneaking in.

This time they kicked the factory doors open and sprinted in with swords at the ready, as the intruder alarms began blaring behind them.

Contrary to popular belief, Gintoki didn’t _enjoy_ fighting. It was something he was good at, there was no denying that. Something he had spent untold hours working to make himself better at. But it was something he did out of necessity. He fought to protect, to defend, to save his own skin...not for fun.

But every once in a while, there came along a moment….one spectacular moment in time when he felt that he could understand why some people did.

He and Hijikata moved together like clockwork, in perfect synchronicity. Enemies bombarded them from all sides, but none of them even came close to them. Hijikata blocked swings aimed at Gintoki sometimes even before he could sense them coming, and in a flash he was reaching out to block one aimed at Hijikata, in turn.

A fight with your life on the line is never fun, but...somehow with Hijikata around it felt different. Effortless, almost.

Little by little, the amount of guards coming at them began to slow.

“I’m going after the kids,” Gintoki called over the alarm’s continued wailing.

Hijikata nodded. “I’ve got your back.”

From the Kawamaki ledger, they had learned all about the Marobo factory’s secret basement level. That was where they kept all their captive workers. A huge underground facility with row after row after row of holding cells. Hundreds of people, most of them only children, kept in the dark and damp, with little to no idea how they had ended up there.

Gintoki had to search for some time to locate the entrance- it really was well-hidden- but eventually he found it.

Just as he pulled the lever, and the camouflaged door set into the wall slid open, Hijikata yelled, “there are more guards coming.”

“What?” Gintoki said, turning back. “How do you know that?”

“There,” Hijikata pointed. Sure enough, out the open doors, a steady stream of men were visible running towards the factory from the direction of the main building, illuminated by the light of several large overhead floodlights outside the factory.

“If we free the prisoners now, they’ll just be running right back into the Marobo’s hands,” Hijikata said grimmly.

“We’ll have to fight, then.”

“By the time we get through that many of them, who knows what else they’ll have brought against us? We can’t fight forever, Gintoki!”

Gintoki growled in frustration. He knew Hijikata was right. But he couldn’t stand the thought of coming so close, only to fail now.

“We should go,” Hijikata urged uneasily, glancing back to the approaching crowd. “While we still can.”

“No,” Gintoki said decisively. “No, we can still do this!”

“We can’t take on a whole army by ourselves!”

“We’re not by ourselves,” Gintoki said, jabbing a finger towards the basement entrance. “We have _them_!”

Hijikata stared at him. “...A bunch of malnourished kids?! That’s your best idea!”

“It’ll be the last thing they expect,” Gintoki insisted. “They’ll never see it coming. And if we’re fast enough, and lucky enough, it’ll at least get everyone clear of the building long enough for us to light this thing up!”

Hijikata hesitated for the briefest moment, but then he closed his eyes.

“Fine. I trust you. What do you need me to do?”

“Find something they can use to defend themselves with,” Gintoki called over his shoulder, breaking into a run towards the basement. “Tools, supplies, anything. I’ll be back in a sec!”

“Hurry!”

Gintoki took the stairs down three at a time, leaping the last few feet down to the ground level and sprinting over to the basement control panel. He flipped on every light there was, and hit the master switch that would open all the holding cell doors.

“Come on,” he yelled, banging his sword against the wall for extra emphasis. “Get up! Get up! Come on, it’s time to run!”

One by one, the captive children stumbled out of bed, confused, murmuring amongst themselves. Until those nearest the stairs noticed Gintoki and figured out what was going on, and began yelling back for the others. They all began moving towards the stairs, helping each other along as they went, clamoring loudly.

Gintoki didn’t exactly wait around for them to follow him, though. He dashed back up to ground level.

“Toshirou! Status report?”

“They’re getting close,” Hijikata yelled. He had managed to gather a few barrels’ worth of some heavy-looking factory equipment parts. “They have guns, Gintoki. This is a bad idea.”

“I _know_ that. But it’s all I’ve got. Think you can come up with something better in the next thirty seconds or so?”

Hijikata opened his mouth to answer, but before he could, the first of the children came flooding out onto the factory floor, yelling over one another anxiously.

Gintoki mutely pointed to the improvised weapons Hijikata had gathered.

The kids sure didn’t need telling twice. They rushed forwards to grab a weapon, and then turned their sights to the factory doors. The sight of the approaching pack of guards didn’t slow them down at all- the ones at the front raised their weapons over their heads and bellowed a furious war cry, and all their fellows followed suit.

For a moment it was all Gintoki could do just to watch them, charging fearlessly out to meet their captors like that. There was an awful sort of familiarity about the whole scene. For one helpless moment, he was a child again, sword in hand, running towards a battle he didn’t fully expect to come back from.

And then Hijikata was there, grabbing his arm, shaking him out of it.

“Come on, we don’t have a lot of time.”

“R-right,” Gintoki said, shaking his head. “Right. Which way...?”

“There, back corner. See, they’ve even labelled it for us.”

“Oh, how considerate.”

The two of them jogged across the factory floor, towards the boiler room. As they went, Hijikata pulled two small flasks of gasoline from their pack of supplies.

“Are you sure this will work?” he asked anxiously, holding one out to Gintoki.

“Positive,” Gintoki said, accepting the flask. “But...now that we’re actually here, I’m worried that we won’t make the door in time. This place is big.”

Hijikata bit his lip, looking quickly around.

“We could go out the window,” he said, pointing. Sure enough, Gintoki could see a large rectangular window, set high in the wall, running along the back wall.

“Alright,” he said, shrugging. “Fuck it, right? It’s all going up in flames anyway.”

“It sure the fuck is.”

The two of them quickly set about pouring out their gasoline, coating the entire inside of the boiler room and leaving a short trail leading back out into the open. When they were done, they grabbed some spare equipment nearby and used it to smash through the window, leaving the way open for their escape.

“Ready?” Hijikata asked Gintoki, pulling a box of matches out of the pack. For all the world he looked calm, serious, determined.

But up close, Gintoki could see his hands trembling.

“Let me have that,” he said, reaching for the matches. “I’ll do it.”

“No, wait,” Hijikata protested, “...wait. I should be the one to do it.”

“You don’t have to, Toshirou. You shouldn’t have to carry that, it’s not on you.”

“I know. But I want to, to...to be the one to end this, I guess. I know this was your job, but I want to be the one to end it. Does that make sense…?”

Gintoki smiled. There was the Hijikata he knew.

“Yes. Now light the damn thing up and let’s get the hell out of here!”

“Alright. Stand back.”

Hijikata lit a match, retreated a few paces, and threw it down onto the gasoline trail.

They waited only long enough to make sure the trail lit. Once they saw the first flame, they turned and _ran_.

Gintoki skidded to a halt under the window and reached out to offer Hijikata a boost up just as the little flame disappeared past the door frame into the boiler room. Hijikata leaned down, in turn, to pull Gintoki up, and just as he got his legs up to the window sill, the explosion went off.

The two of them were thrown down to the ground below, the sound of the unexpectedly powerful blast momentarily deafening them. Gintoki winced- he’d hit the ground pretty hard. But then the distant sound of panicked shouting reached him, and he struggled to push himself up.

“The car,” he yelled over the ringing in his ears, “Toshirou, we gotta get to the car!”

“Right behind you,” Hijikata yelled back, getting shakily to his feet.

They moved as quickly as they could, circling back around the burning factory and heading for where they had left their rental. As they went, Gintoki was thrilled to see the Marobo guards actively ignoring the fleeing children in favor of scrambling to find a way to put the fire out before it could spread further.

Unnoticed, they hastily got back into their car and sped away, off into the night.

The burning factory stood out starkly against the darkness in the rearview mirror like a beacon, clearly visible for miles across the flat, open landscape.

Gintoki threw back his head and laughed. He couldn’t help it- he felt giddy. Maybe it was the fact that their plan had worked better than either of them had dared to hope for, despite the fact that they’d both almost been killed at least a handful times apiece. Maybe it was relief, maybe it was some sort of triumph. Maybe he was going crazy. Or maybe the adrenaline of the whole thing just hadn’t quite worn off just yet.

Whatever the reason, he laughed. And beside him in the driver’s seat, Hijikata laughed, too.

He was still laughing when they pulled into their hotel parking lot twenty minutes later, and as they snuck around and back through their room’s open window.

“Dude, shut up, you’re going to get us caught!” Hijikata hissed at him, but he was smiling.

“Sorry,” Gintoki said, fighting to compose himself. “I just still can’t believe we really did that!”

“I know,” Hijikata agreed, his smile widening. “I can’t believe it either.”

“Did you even _see_ that fire?! What a blaze!”

“Yeah, whatever unprocessed crops they were storing in there must have been extra flammable!”

“No way they’re ever coming back from this. They’ve lost their factory, a season’s worth of crops, and their entire population of slave workers in one fell swoop. Talk about going out with a _bang_ , haha!” he laughed again, throwing his arms out to his sides for emphasis.

“Hey,” Hijikata frowned, pointing, “what happened to your hand?”

“Huh?”

Gintoki looked at his palm. There was a long slice across his palm, smeared with blood.

“Oh. Must have cut it when we landed on the glass...to be honest, I didn’t even notice it until now.”

“Here,” Hijikata said, reaching for the supply pack yet again, “let me see.”

Gintoki obediently held out his hand. Hijikata gently took it in his own hand, and began carefully winding a bandage around the cut.

“Anyway,” Gintoki continued, “that whole thing was...really something. Jeez, I mean, that fight...we made a really good team back there.”

“Yeah, we did, didn’t we? We were so...synched, somehow. I wish I could have seen us.”

“...Toshirou?”

“Yeah?”

“I’m glad you were the one with me for this.”

“Oh.” Hijikata’s eyes flickered up to meet Gintoki’s, just for a second, before flicking back down to the bandage in his hands. “Yeah, I mean, I guess...I’m glad to have been here, too.”

“Good. That’s good.”

There was an awkward pause, a beat of silence, while Hijikata knotted off the bandage. Gintoki felt like he should say something, but before he figured out what, Hijikata let go of his hand.

“W-we should...we should sleep,” he said, turning away. “We’ve got a lot to do before we leave in the morning.”

The next morning, the news was flooded with pictures of the Marobo factory. Just as they had hoped, while inspecting the cause of the fire, the authorities had discovered the secret basement level, along with a couple of other oddities that didn’t quite line up. There was talk of launching a full scale investigation into the family’s business dealings. With already enough coverage in the media to ensure that there could be no clever cover-up, and enough evidence to incriminate not only the Marobos but also every other family they worked with, it seemed as though the CAPS had well and truly been brought crashing down.

Hijikata and Gintoki didn’t stick around to celebrate their victory long, though. They hopped on the first train back to Edo that they could get tickets for, stopping only long enough to pick up breakfast and drinks from a vending machine outside the station first.

Their job was done. It was time for them to head home again.

“There you are,” Hijikata said, stepping out onto the train’s open-air caboose platform. “I was looking for you.”

“Sorry,” Gintoki said, from where he stood, leaning over with his elbows resting on the railing, “I just came out for some fresh air.”

“Two more major sources just picked up the Marobo story,” Hijikata said, moving over to join him. “One of them based in Edo. And it’s trending all over social media.”

“Exactly how long are you gonna spend with your nose in your phone, following that shit? You don’t need to read the news stories, you know what happened! You were there!”

“I know! I just want to make sure the word gets out. I don’t want these assholes to get away with anything.”

“They won’t.”

“I know. I know. Still, it’s a...it’s a good feeling.”

“Ha, I can’t argue with that.”

Gintoki smiled, lifting his chin, letting the cool breeze wash over him, ruffling his hair. Hijikata smiled, too.

“Toshirou, what are you going to tell Kondo when we get back? We never did give him a real excuse for running off the way we did.”

“Oh, man. I don’t know, I hadn’t thought about it. What do you think I should tell him?”

“Hmm...well, probably not the truth. I know you don’t like the idea of lying to him, but, you know. Arson.”

“Among other things, yeah.”

“Hmmmmm.”

The two of them lapsed into silence for a moment. A comfortable kind of silence, so different from their first train ride together, just a few days ago. Hijikata’s thoughts wandered.

“I honestly don’t know what I’m going to tell him,” he sighed eventually. “Because, no matter what I say, I have a feeling he’s still going to-”

“Can I kiss you?”

“-figure out that it was...wait, _what_?”

“Can I kiss you,” Gintoki repeated, holding Hijikata’s gaze steadily, despite the deep flush spreading rapidly across his face.

Hijikata felt the heat quickly rising in his own face, too, his heart racing as he stared back at Gintoki with a mixture of confusion, intrigue, and mild horror.

“Y-you want...you’re serious?” he spluttered.

“Not if you don’t want to,” Gintoki said quickly, waving his hands in front of him, “we don’t have to!”

“I don’t believe this…”

“Look, we really don’t have to if you don’t want to-”

“Well, I didn’t say that-”

“You know, I just thought I’d ask-”

“Gintoki, it’s not like that-”

“But if you don’t want to, forget it, forget the whole-”

“Gintoki!”

“Ah! Uh. Y...Yeah?”

“I d-don’t not...argh! I do want you to kiss me.”

Gintoki blinked. “...For real?”

“Well,” Hijikata muttered stubbornly, “unless _you_ don’t want to.”

“No, I definitely want to,” Gintoki said, maybe a little breathlessly, clearly fighting to keep down a laugh, and Hijikata’s treacherous heart beat even faster.

“Well, if you’re gonna do it, do it already!”

“Ok! Just...close your eyes.”

Hijikata swallowed hard, and obediently squeezed his eyes shut tight. There was a brief pause, during which he was suddenly hyper-aware of how awkward and inexperienced he must look, how decidedly unromantic he was making this.

But then Gintoki’s lips were on his, and none of that really seemed to matter any more.

**Author's Note:**

> The End! Special thanks to:  
> 1) the mods who organized this whole Birthday Bash event- this fic probably never would have happened without you guys!  
> 2) velvetcat09, for their STUNNING illustration, and for being such an absolute JOY to work with. (If, for some reason, the image in this fic isn't loading for you, click to view it in all its glory here: https://velvvetcat09.tumblr.com/post/631410856285143040/trust-the-thorn-in-your-side-its-trying-to-tell )  
> 3) and to you, dear readers! I hope you liked it!


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